D&D 5E Half (High) Elf Swashbuckler

[TwoSix]

I'll get a campfire going and we can all toast some S'Mores and sing Kumbaya. Later we'll slip a couple of multi-class builds into @DEFCON 1 's DM binder and titter about it in our tents while we tell ghost stories and light up the bottom of our faces with cheap dollar store flashlights.

"Did you ever hear the story of the escaped mental patient? The one they called the Reskinner? They say he would hunt around adventuring parties, just like this one, and then grab a lonely subclass and RIP THEIR SKIN OFF!! "

 

[Fenris-77]

"Did you ever hear the story of the escaped mental patient? The one they called the Reskinner? They say he would hunt around adventuring parties, just like this one, and then grab a lonely subclass and RIP THEIR SKIN OFF!! "

Scary stuff! Then I'll tell the one about the hooker with dysentery.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I take a little bit of exception to that, since I'm the one that mentioned Hexblade. I did specifically call out that I thought the flavor of the build was great, that Hexblade was "only if you wanted to trick out the build" (i.e. optimize it), and that OP and their DM would have to be onboard with reskinning (since Hexblade's default flavor doesn't mesh well with the concept.)

The reason I suggest it is because I believe strongly that the flavor of a character isn't derived purely from the narration of the concept, it's also driven by what the character can actually do. Successful, strong characters have more flavor (and transmit that flavor to the table) better than a character that isn't as good at what they do.

I understand what you're saying and agree to a certain extent... obviously being able to do certain things certainly makes the combat mini-game more fun. If there's a part of your concept you can't do mechanically as well as other players with a straight build, then doing a feature swap or multiclassing to get that mechanic is understandable. The main one I think of when talking about this is always the Two-Weapon Fighting Style for PCs other than Fighters and Rangers. If you have a flavorful reason for dual-wielding as non-Fighter or Ranger-- like for instance you're a cleric and your deity's weapons are dual-wielded-- working to get the fighting style so you can add the modifier to the off-hand is fine. I wouldn't argue with that at all, and in fact would say doing so is helping your PC's flavor.

But when people comment about all the ways how the PC could get better mechanically without ever explaining why it would help them thematically, that's why I made my comment. In your case in particular for instance of the level of Hexblade... I can't help but wonder how the character's essence of being a high elf swashbuckler becomes better by switching over to half-elf and using CHA rather than DEX for combat? Obviously switching High to Half is purely mechanical... you're doing it for the bonus to CHA... and now you also have a Hexblade's Curse for additional damage, higher crit range and healing yourself when you kill someone? Even if you try and reskin it away from some sort of magic... how do any of that (attacking with CHA, healing after killing someone, not to mention now actually having spellcasting) make the character more of a swashbuckler? I dunno... in my opinion it doesn't enhance the rogue swashbuckler flavor concept at all. So to me... yes, it just seems to be a bid for mechanical enhancement only.

But if you or @Elfcrusher disagree with that "hot take" (as I pointed it out as being in my very first sentence) feel free to build your characters however you want. It doesn't matter to me. But I'm also not going to stop pointing it out. I figure if six people can post obvious min-maxing recommendations in half-a-dozen posts... the thread can handle a single person who says "You don't have to min-max at all, you know. The game can work fine as it is."

 

[DEFCON 1]

"Guys...? Guys...? Where'd you go? Where are you? Guys...?"

[Looks up just as the insane SORLOCK steps out of the shadows...]

"NO! NO NO NO!!! This makes no sense! Why would someone born with magical power then bargain with an extra-planar entity for DIFFERENT magical power?!?"

[The SORLOCK raises its short-rested metamagic]

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

 

[Fenris-77]

Personally, I couldn't care less about optimization. It's not something that factors into my character builds. Sometimes a MC idea that's perfect for a concept might also be optimized in some other ways, but that wouldn't be why I picked it. In a lot of cases this comes down to various gish concept builds that aren't well supported by the existing class and subclass offerings. Some Assassin concepts spring to mind for example, as do a bunch of fun Ninja builds, as well as some Shaman builds based on Barbarian. Anyway, for me, MCing is about cool factor and concept.

 

[TwoSix]

But when people comment about all the ways how the PC could get better mechanically without ever explaining why it would help them thematically, that's why I made my comment. In your case in particular for instance of the level of Hexblade... I can't help but wonder how the character's essence of being a high elf swashbuckler becomes better by switching over to half-elf and using CHA rather than DEX for combat? Obviously switching High to Half is purely mechanical... you're doing it for the bonus to CHA... and now you also have a Hexblade's Curse for additional damage, higher crit range and healing yourself when you kill someone? Even if you try and reskin it away from some sort of magic... how do any of that (attacking with CHA, healing after killing someone, not to mention now actually having spellcasting) make the character more of a swashbuckler? I dunno... in my opinion it doesn't enhance the rogue swashbuckler flavor concept at all. So to me... yes, it just seems to be a bid for mechanical enhancement only.

1) To my mind, having a high Cha seems to me to support a concept emphasizing guile, panache, and breezy repartee. If your Swashbuckler concept is more about the physicality, doing acrobatic tricks and such, this would be less appealing, of course.

2) The curse just becomes a focus on a particular enemy you really need to finish off, sort of like a dueling/marking mechanic. A rush of adrenaline after finishing off that enemy seems appropriate to me. Again, easy to reskin.

3) I always like giving my elven characters a bit of inherent magic, since that seems like a very elven thing to me. Some cantrips and one spell every short rest certainly seems like a character with an elven heritage to me.

 

[Guest 6801328]

2) The curse just becomes a focus on a particular enemy you really need to finish off, sort of like a dueling/marking mechanic. A rush of adrenaline after finishing off that enemy seems appropriate to me.

Not that the Warlock dip appeals to me, but there is some thematic synergy between curse and Panache.

 

[michaelhorvath80]

9th lvl swashbuckler half-elf here just leveled up from 5th to 9th (thanks to a deck of many things) picked up magic initiate feat for my 8th lvl ASI. Took BB cantrip and find familiar, and holy COW it rocks!!! Have a reskined owl (miniature peacock) so I get advantage on my only attack and with a +10 to hit (+5DEX mod +4 proficien mod +1 rapier) almost never misses. My output of 2d8+5d6+6 is awesome. A crit is just silly since my table goes with max damage on the first set of dice (the dice you roll on a normal hit) then roll the extra dice from the crit. So for me it's 52 damage plus the 2d8+5d6. For me the utility of a familiar is better then elven accuracy, since I can disengage for free to get them to chase me and proc the extra 2d8 from BB. My table does the flanking rules as well so I might take elven accuracy at 12th since I should pretty much always have advantage may as well roll a third d20 for crits, or if I flub the first two rolls.

Watch the language, please.